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A Discourse on Winning and Losing

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A Discourse on Winning and Losing A Discourse on Winning and Losing Col John R. Boyd, USAF, Retired Edited and Compiled by Dr. Grant T. Hammond Air University Press Curtis E. LeMay Center for Doctrine Development and Education Maxwell AFB, Alabama March 2018 Content Editor Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data James S. Howard Copy Editor Names: Boyd, John, 1927–1997, author. | Hammond, Grant Tedrick, Tammi K. Dacus 1945- editor. | Air University (U.S.). Press, publisher. Title: A discourse on winning and losing / John R. Boyd ; edited Cover Art, Book Design, and Illustrations and compiled by Grant T. Hammond. Daniel Armstrong Description: First edition. | Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama : Composition and Prepress Production Air University Press, [2017]. | Includes bibliographical references Nedra O. Looney and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2017039845 | ISBN 978585662791 (paperback) Print Preparation and Distribution Subjects: LCSH: Military art and science. | Strategy. | Command Diane Clark of troops. Director and Publisher Classification: LCC U162 .B76 2017 | DDC 355.001—dc23 | Dr. Ernest Allan Rockwell SUDOC D 301.26/6:D 63 LC record available at https://lccn. loc.gov/2017039845 Air University Press 600 Chennault Circle, Bldg. 1405 Maxwell AFB, AL 36112-6010 http://www.airuniversity.af.mil/AUPress/ Published by Air University Press in March 2018 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AirUnivPress and Twitter: https://twitter.com/aupress Disclaimer Opinions, conclusions, and recommendations expressed or implied within are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official policy or position of the organizations with which they are associated or the views of the Air University Press, Air University, United States Air Force, Department of Defense, or any other US government agency. This publica- Air University Press tion is cleared for public release. Editorial Note: Colonel Boyd’s typography, spellings, and punctuations have been retained for the sake of historicity. Copy the graphic below to make an aid for scanning the QR codes. iii Contents Introduction 1 A Discourse on Winning and Losing 13 Patterns of Conflict 17 Organic Design for Command and Control 217 The Strategic Game of “ ? and ? ” 255 Destruction and Creation 315 Conceptual Spiral 327 Revelation 365 Bibliography 367 Afterword 381 Appendix The OODA Loop 383 Index 387 v Introduction to “A Discourse on Winning and Losing ” Having written the first book on John Boyd that fo- August 1987 briefing reproduced here is but one of 19 cused more on his ideas than his personal story, I have different versions that I have seen. However, it is the been asked by colleagues at Air University Press to edit most widely distributed one and has become the touch- and introduce the publication of John Boyd’s famous stone of Boyd’s thinking and most readily referred to briefing entitled “A Discourse on Winning and Losing.” corpus for many. I am happy to do so. This is an important event and will What follows is only a thin veneer, to whet your ap- make Boyd’s original presentation of his ideas available petite for Boyd in the “original,” an effort to allow you to a wider audience. Moreover, it will allow readers to to have your conversation with his ideas. I do not wish have their own interaction directly with Boyd’s thought to poison the well with my own interpretations. They rather than through an interlocutor. For those who are available in more detail elsewhere. Rather, I seek to know of Boyd and/or his ideas, you may want to skip give a brief overview of the richness of some of his ideas this introduction and go directly to the briefings. This as an invitation to explore further. To give you a flavor would not be as good as a conversation with Boyd, but of Boyd’s briefings, the staff at Air University Press has it is as close as we can have. inserted QR codes for YouTube clips of portions of the In introducing the 327 slides of “A Discourse on briefings as Boyd gave them in the early 1990s. You may Winning and Losing,” I am hesitant. Boyd’s briefings not be able to have a conversation with Boyd yourself, were never meant to be a compilation of doctrine or but you can partake of the experience vicariously as he dogma about how to fight and win wars. They were interacts with his audiences in the “Discourse.” meant to be conversations between him and his au- While Boyd’s initial focus was a 193 slide summation diences. He never gave a briefing in which he did not of military history in the “Patterns of Conflict” brief, learn something. He might have poorly conveyed a his effort soon expanded dramatically. As he read, he particular idea or skipped a step in the logic trail. Alter- thought, and as he thought, he tried to explain the con- natively, perhaps, he forgot something or someone had nections, the anomalies, the advantages, and limita- added to the examples he used, the references he had tions of various forms, styles, and strategies of military consulted, or provided a different interpretation that he conflict. His insights led him to introduce the theory of should have considered more deeply. Consequently, the maneuver warfare as critical to military success in general briefings were always in flux. He would agonize for weeks as it had been for successful air-to-air tactics where his over a single word for just the right meaning. The intellectual journey began. His study and thought led 2 │ INTRODUCTION him to produce a series of other briefings becoming John R. Boyd parts of the larger “Discourse.” They included a 37 slide briefing entitled “Organic Design for Command and This nation lost an incredible array of talent in 1997. Control,” a 58-slide briefing entitled “The Strategic A premier fighter pilot, a man of legendary skill and Game of ? and ?,” a 27-slide briefing entitled “Conceptual scholarship who wrote the first manual on jet aerial Spiral,” and one of the few essays he ever wrote called combat, developed tactics against Soviet planes and “Destruction and Creation.” This latter piece, placed surface-to-air missiles (SAM), and thereby saved innu- near the end of the compilation, was actually the begin- merable lives in Vietnam, died. So too did one of the ning of Boyd’s intellectual odyssey in earnest, as it was nation’s premier aircraft designers whose work on written and mimeographed on 3 September 1976, only something called Energy-Maneuverability Theory changed a year after his retirement. It was for Boyd, in many the way aircraft were designed and tested. He, more ways, the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end than anyone else, was largely responsible for the develop- of his thinking. He debated where it belonged in the ment of both the US Air Force’s premier fighters, the sequence but chose ultimately to place it near the end. F-15 Eagle and the F-16 Fighting Falcon. The larger “Discourse” ends with his summation entitled One of the more original students of military history “Revelation.” To this we have added a four slide brief on was also lost. His studies of war and warfare through “The Essence of Winning and Losing” produced on 28 the ages changed how the US armed forces prepared for June 1995. It is an effort to compress all that he had warfighting in the last quarter of the twentieth century. learned into a simple, yet elegant and comprehensive, His views on maneuver warfare helped change the US Aerial Attack Study conclusion embedded in his concept of OODA Loops, Marine Corps and the US Army. He succumbed laboring what they mean and why they are important. Com- behind the scenes, waging a more-than-decade-long bined with the “Discourse,” this is the main body of campaign to change how the US military went about Boyd’s thinking, leaving his “Aerial Attack Study,” and the business of defense, changing the procurement “Fast Transients,” essays he wrote while on active duty.1 process, and helping to improve the weaponry in the Fast Transients For those unfamiliar with John Boyd or his impor- US arsenal. tance in military thought, I wish to present a succinct A great original thinker, whose views on learning introduction to the man and his accomplishments as I and thinking, surviving, and prospering in a complex did in my book about him, The Mind of War: John Boyd world have infected American business and education, and American Security. The reader can find a great deal also passed from the scene. His notions of competition more in the bibliography of materials about Boyd and and time cycles—observation, orientation, decisions, the influence of his ideas at the end of this volume. action, the OODA Loop—have followers around the INTRODUCTION │ 3 world who study and employ his insights in a variety of business schools and war colleges around the globe. ways and professions. Lastly, a paragon of virtue—loved There are hundreds of websites, blogs, and sources of the OOda Loop by many in politics, business, and the military for his commentary and discussion about Boyd and his ideas character and integrity—was gone. He shunned per- on the Internet in several languages.3 However, until sonal wealth and private gain for service to his country. now; there has not been a book publication of “A Dis- That the nation is less for the passing of all of these course on Winning and Losing.” This Air University should be obvious. That they were little honored is re- Press volume reproduces an enhanced facsimile of grettable, but perhaps understandable. None was a Boyd’s August 1987 version of “A Discourse.” This is the published author, decorated hero, high-ranking govern- most widely disseminated and copied version, passed ment official, or academician of renown.
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